


Never The Same River Twice

by without_wings (liam22)



Category: Legend of the Seeker
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-23
Updated: 2009-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-05 02:56:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/37042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liam22/pseuds/without_wings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zedd told him their love could never be.  His heart was tell him something different.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never The Same River Twice

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Belle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Belle/gifts).



She always knew there were some things she could never have. Her powers, the good she could do, they were more important than the happiness any family unit of her own could bring her. There might not be children running around her feet and a man she loved holding her with patient arms, but would do everything in her power to make sure others could have those things.

These were the sacrifices that needed to be made for the good of the whole. She had made peace with that, she really had.

And then, she met Richard.

–

He knew, from the moment he reached out his hand to help her off the ground, he knew. The ground was littered with bodies of D'haran soldiers, but all he saw was her. Her white dress was muddy and her eyes were clear. He didn't want to let go of her hand.

"That's the second time you saved my life." There is something astonished in her voice, as if the proof of all the prophecies she heard as a little girl were standing right in front of her. He supposed that was pretty close to the truth. He gathered her in a hug. The action never felt more right.

He was determined to be there every time her life needed saving. She would do the same for him, this he knew.

–

His eyes could not help but follow her everywhere she went. Love at first sight was an entirely silly concept. So why did his heart race when she was near?

She made him feel like he could take on the world with him at her side. When they fought together, their actions were synced as if fate had choreographed them ahead of time. It wasn't love. It was something more. Destiny.

Zedd said it could never be. Warned him multiple times, in fact, as Kahlan stayed oblivious to his attentions. That didn't matter.

His heart was telling him something completely different.

–

When he first met her, he would have sworn she didn't know how to laugh. With all her talk of destiny and the greater good, of special swords and dark magic, it was an easy mistake to make. She got very serious when she was talking about saving the world.

Looking at her now, he wondered how he ever could have thought that. She walked along beside him close enough that their shoulders bumped every now and then. Her head was tossed back in laughter at his impression of Zedd warding off the still wet tree branches. She got into the act with an even better impression of his dislike for the large mud puddles the latest storm had left behind.

Every time the older man would whip around to check on them, they would freeze like naughty school children, the laughter gone from all but their eyes. The moment he turned back around, he could hear more of the faint giggling.

Zedd mock sighed, but didn't say anything. After the latest battle they had gotten into, those two deserved every moment of levity they could find.

–

They practiced swordplay on the afternoons when the sun was high in the sky. Zedd would be off taking a nap, or doing whatever wizards did on their downtime. They would find a clearing and practice fighting until the sun was setting and their arms ached.

They swords would clink off each other in fast and rhythmic dance. Her eyes lite up with a concentration that was mesmerizing and he couldn't help put pour as much effort into their game as she was. She was far and away the most evenly matched sparring partner he'd ever had. Kahlan met every swipe of his blade with one of his own, teasing him the whole time about how the world was in danger if this was the best he could do. He teased her back. It was the least he could do. And then they would get silent once more, throwing in harder moves with more complicated footwork.

He didn't realize it until much later; they flirted with weapons long before they were comfortable enough to flirt with words.

–

She had to tell herself over and over again that it was for his own good. He didn't know what he felt for her really. Even if he did, the life she could give him was not one she'd ever wish on a man she loved. Midnight confessions in the forest, desperate clinging kisses, they were all simply products of being around each other as often as they were. It was bound to happen and it meant nothing.

She could see his heart drop right out of his eyes when she told him, "I don't have any feelings for you." Her voice rasped against her throat and sound hallow to even her own ears. Still he took her words as the truth. He always wore his heart on his sleeve, and even she could tell that she had just broken it.

His hands formed fists in his pockets and he took a step back. Slightly over his left shoulder was the closest she got to looking him right in the eye. Her posture was as rigid as his. Where was Zedd to break up the tension when you needed him.

She was determined he would never know how much of a lie it was, that it hurt her to say it. "I don't have any feelings for you, Richard. And I never will."

–

After that, the joking all but stopped. The flirty sparring turned more intense. The more he tried to put her at ease, the more focused on the mission she became. He wanted his Kahlan back. The girl that was not only his partner and protector, but his friend.

He cornered her over the fire pit once Zedd was asleep. "We need to stop this, Kahlan. We can't be these people."

She sighed and stirred the coals with a stick. Why wouldn't she meet his eyes?

He played his ace, at this point he had nothing left to loose. "We won't be able to defeat Rahl without each other. We both need to be in top form. We both need to start trusting each other again."

She looked up at that, and he could tell he had surprised her. "Okay," she had said slowly. And then, "So which one of us is going to tell Zedd that he's snoring again."

The fight was forgotten. If only he could forget the memory of the press of her lips as easily.

–

He was under a spell, living in a dreamworld where she didn't exist. Part of his brain was screaming that this was a nightmare, but the rest of him wouldn't listen. And then he heard her voice, cutting thought the fog of dark magic.

"That night in the forest, I never wanted that kiss to end."

All she had to do was say it and he was back there with her on that night. The passion, the desperation, the annoyance. He felt it all.

Memories of her tumbled together, keeping him tethered to reality. It was Kahlan he wanted; the girl he laughed with, the girl who fought by his side, the girl that meant everything.

He opened his eyes and saw everything he felt for her staring right back at him.

–

"Rahl was wrong when he said our fate was unimaginable." He starred into her eyes and took her hand. He didn't like what he saw in the eyes that met hers. "The only unimaginable fate is the one without you."

He could tell her forever. He could scream if off mountain tops and let the wind carry his proclamations of love down to all the people. He still had the dreaded feeling she would never believe it.

–

Richard was a hugger. There were hello hugs, goodbye hugs, comfort hugs, congratulation hugs, 'I can't believe we survived that' hugs, and, her favorite, just because hugs. She could tell the difference between each one now.

He hugged when other men would have kissed, or teased, or stormed away. He hugged when the world was down and she could almost feel him picking it right back up. He had yet to find an occasion when a good strong hug from him couldn't brighten her mood.

Yet sometimes, she secretly hated those hugs. Their bodies fit together more perfectly than she ever could have imagined. It was a bit of a tease, being so close to him, so intimate, and not being able to love him fully. She never told him this. She didn't know what she would do if he stopped those hugs.

She wished she could say she didn't need those hugs just as much as he did.

–

Memories of kissing her tied him up in knots. He could not let them go.

It doesn't quite count, he tried to tell himself. It wasn't the two of them making passionate advances toward one another. His body won't listen. It ached for her in a way that not even dunks in the cool fall river sated.

Not that she was helping any, traipsing around without her white confessor's dress and with her hair pulled up to expose her neck.

He promised himself the next time he kissed her, and there would be a next time, it would be of his own doing.

–

He had never met anyone else like her. There was a goodness about her that went down farther than her duties as a Confessor. She would give until there was nothing left. She'd stop at nothing to protect their mission.

Her faith in him was even more shocking. He could be down to his very last reserve of strength, teetering on the edge of failure, and there she would be, telling him that together they would make it though. She believed in him when even he couldn't.

Her love for him defied all boundaries. Across time and space, even when all hope was gone, she still loved him. Sometimes he wondered what he had done to deserve someone like her.

Together they stood overlooking the great sea as it crashed down against the banks of the shore. He reached out and hugged her close. It was over. Everything had been restored to its rightful order. Yet something still felt amiss. He didn't want to think about it.

He tightened his grip on her and she buried her face against his neck. Saving their people would have to wait.

–

"Are you going to marry Richard?" Rachel had asked at their celebration banquet. She had been hugging her doll up against her chest and looking up at Kahlan with bright eyes. She knew what the girl was thinking: "That's how it always ends in the storybooks."

It feels like forever ago since Kahlan herself was that innocent.

It's not that she doesn't want it. Everyone and Mother Earth must have known how strongly she felt for Richard. But those feelings could never come to be.

The way his eye catches hers made her remember the last time she held a baby, her nephew, a male confessor. She remembered how felt so tiny and precious in her arms, how he stopped squirming as Richard fed him the way his father used to. She'll never forget the look they shared. It made her want to forget everything but running away with the child and raising it as their own.

The look of longing in Richard's eyes burned. He would make a wonderful husband, an even more wonderful father. She knew he tried to keep that desire hidden from her. He continuously repeated that those trappings of a normal life meant nothing without her.

Sometimes she hated a part of herself for stealing them from him.

–

"Your hair is getting long," she told him. She stepped closer to run her fingers through the strands that have fallen into his eyes. Their eyes locked and this time he took a step closer. His hands hovered not quite touching her, not yet. "I don't know how you can see like this."

The next town they find, she procured scissors and talked him into letting her trim his hair. Not that he had put up much of a fight. She could pretty much talk him into anything.

She's either extremely careful or simply pokey for she spent much more time trimming his hair than he'd ever done before.

But with the way she was massaging his scalp, he couldn't bring himself to tease her about it.

–

He's sitting close enough that his body heat provides as much warmth as the fire in front of her.

Memories of being Confessed haunt him. None more so than the look on her face when he told her he loved someone else. Not even the one of her body pressed against his and his lips nipping at her neck.

He knew he needed to apologies. He didn't know what to say. He didn't care whether or not they could ever be together the way he longed for. He didn't even care that they might have missed their one chance at starting a family together. Although, just once would he like to kiss her like that under his own fruition. Just once. She never lets him that close.

"Kahlan" The way his voice broke over the syllables in her name made the pit of her stomach burn. He had said 'I love her' the same lifeless way. She moved to the other side of the fire pit.

He never wanted to put that look on her face again.

–

She has this dream of them that warmed her heart even when the winter chill nipped at her toes. After all of their work is done and they've given their bodies back to the land, they could finally be together the way they have both been longing for.

They'd float over valleys, soar past the peaks of mountains, only coming down to splash in the rivers. They would dance their bodies together in the moonlight, and tangle themselves up in the sheets of prairie grass. She would feel each one of his kisses right down to her very soul.

And they would be one, together.


End file.
